The Pan-African Parliament's Model Law on Implementation: A missing link for domestic implementation of the judgments of the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights

Journal article

One of the central challenges in the implementation of any reparations awarded or recommended by supranational bodies such as the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights lies in identifying what initiates the national-level administrative processes that must follow. Failure to implement is often attributed to a lack of 'political will', but this conceals the intricate network of factors, relationships and actors affecting the domestic implementation ofinternational judgments. Decisions from judicial and quasi-judicial organs of the African Union, such as the African Court, often have an unclear status when they reach the domestic level. They may not be considered 'foreign judgments' and, therefore, able to be enforced by domestic courts, nor are they 'self-executing'. In some states there is 'enabling legislation' which provides national courts with the ability to enforce decisions of supranational bodies, clarifies the process for their implementation or ensures the decisions are seen as self-executing. Model laws have been adopted by the Pan-African Parliament to offer practical, legislative guidance and solutions for national legislatures and state authorities. This article suggests that the Pan-African Parliament's draft Model Law on Implementation of Decisions of the African Human Rights Bodies (Model Law on Implementation) constitutes a missing link for implementation of the African Court. It offers a toolbox of clauses for states to use at the domestic level in order to bridge the gap between the supranational decisions and their national implementation in a practical way, offering a product that can be adapted by states to suit their national context.

Authors: Clément, PM; Murray, R

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Pretoria University Law Press
• Journal: African Human Rights Law Journal
• Volume: 25
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 1045-1062
• Publication date: 2025-01-27
• DOI: 10.17159/1996-2096/2025/v25n2a25
• EISSN: 1996-2096
• ISSN: 1609-073X
• Language: English
• Keywords: Human rights; Fundamental rights; Toolbox; Legislature; Parliament; International human rights law; Order (exchange); State (computer science)